APRIL 6, 2023 – (Cont.) After a late lunch, Illiana repaired to her “artist’s corner” of our house, where her old-fashioned school desk is surrounded by drawing materials, well organized by her grandmother. She designed a thank-you card out of writing and construction paper, which Beth helped glue together. The artwork on the cover and the neatly printed thank you message inside were entirely Illiana’s. And as we’ve long observed, she was never quite finished with the artwork. I often say to her, “An artist’s work is never . . .” letting her add the last word—“. . . done.”
The three of us then dressed back up for winter and walked to Fred’s house to deliver the thank-you card. I was glad we attended to this, for we later learned that it was hardly the only “thank you” of its kind that Fred would receive.
We then hiked back toward our house. As we rounded the last corner, we encountered a woman also bundled up against winter and wearing sunglasses to shield bright sunbeams bouncing off last night’s fresh quilt of snow. Soon we recognized each other. The woman was . . . Denise, the effervescent founder and conductor of the “Heights Summer Orchestra.” I introduced her to Beth, which led to a brief but robust conversation.
Illiana was eager to get back to our house, however, to continue her activities, so she and Beth continued on to our abode. Denise and I, meanwhile, continued our earlier conversation about music, the orchestra and Denise’s programming ideas.
After she mentioned a few familiar pieces for which she’d already procured sheet music, I asked Denise if she’s including any songs from The Sound of Music, the famous film version of which Beth, Illiana and I had watched the previous evening—for the second time in a week.
“Oh yes,” Denise said. “‘Edelweiss.’”
I told her it was one of my favorite songs—however corny my tastes might seem. First, “Edelweiss” reminds me of my 1979 sojourn in Salzburg with my sister Jenny: while I spent one day hiking to the summit ridge of the mountains behind Salzburg, Jenny embarked with another couple of American tourists on a Sound of Music tour led by none other than one “Bob,” who, improbably, was an expatriate American. (The tour was a bust, but it provided Jenny with lots of humorous story-telling material.) Second, in the musical “Edelweiss” symbolized Austrian resistance to the Nazi Anschluss. Third, when Illiana’s father, our oldest son Cory, was a very young child, Beth sang “Edelweiss” to him at bedtime every night; I loved to hear her sing it.
Just then, I mentioned to Denise another potential player for the orchestra.
“Denise, we’ve got to recruit another violinist,” I said. “Her name is Xin, and she lives at the end of the next block. I haven’t seen her or her husband, Edward, since before the Covid lockdown, but I’d gotten to know her after she heard me practicing one summer evening and the next day, left a beautiful letter in our mailbox. She grew up in China then some years ago, immigrated here and is a veteran RN or PA—I’m not sure which—at [a large local medical center in Minneapolis]. She’d been looking for a teacher and wondered if I’d be interested in taking her on as a student. A few days later she brought her fiddle down to our house to play some Bach. She’s quite advanced, and I introduced her to a good friend of mine who’s a professional violinist—performer and teacher.
“I feel bad that we’ve lost touch, but I can dig out her email address and put her in touch with you.
“That would be terrific!” said Denise.
“I know she’d love to participate,” I said. With that I happened to hear a car slowly approaching behind me. Instinctively I turned to ensure I wasn’t in its path toward the corner stop sign. As I did so, I caught sight of none other than . . . Xin, Edward and their Great Pyrennees . . . hiking up the sidewalk toward us, not 50 feet away.
How I delighted in the sight! Of course, I introduced Denise and her inspired idea about the neighborhood orchestra. Xin’s spontaneous enthusiasm was exactly as I’d predicted, and Denise was thrilled.
As contact information was shared, who should walk up to us on his daily walk but . . . Fred—whose Easter egg hunt party had set in motion the circle of wondrous encounters that now bound our neighborhood ever more tightly.
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© 2023 by Eric Nilsson
